This material is based upon work
supported bythe National Science
Foundation under NSF- RUI Grant No.
PHY-0651627 and NSF- RUI Grant No. MRI-0319523.

Ion Beam Induced Luminescence
(IBIL) is an ion beam analysis (IBA) technique that can be used in conjunction
with the IBA method of Particle Induced X-Ray Emission (PIXE) for geological
analysis of minerals. In IBIL, visible light is emitted by sample minerals
during proton irradiation when transition metals, rare earth metals, and
lattice
defects are
present in the crystal. Orientation dependance
of the luminescence in feldspars has been observed and it results from the crystals
having multiple faces for electron channeling. IBIL was compared to the established
technique of Cathode Luminescence (CL) and specific peaks were found to be shifted
due to localized heating and crystal properties. IBIL has been shown to be a
viable alternative to CL for the geological analysis of minerals and it has the
advantage of being less
subject
to surface inhomogeneity.